just remember you will always burn as bright
by DreamersMyth27
Summary: Five knows the possible consequences of going into his thirteen-year-old body. He knows he'll go through puberty… again. (As if the first time wasn't bad enough.) He knows he'll have to deal with being treated like a thirteen-year-old by his technically younger siblings. He knows he may end up with some flashbacks, that he could suddenly have his brain explode.


**So, I've fallen into the pit that is The Umbrella Academy. I'm not even upset. I had this idea after the first episode, but I waited to write it until I'd seen a few more. Keep in mind that I haven't seen the whole series yet, so some things may be different or characterizations. The science I do discuss is dubious at best too. But that shouldn't stop you from enjoying it!**

**The title is also from the MCR song The Light Behind Your Eyes. I found this specific lyric very fitting.**

**P.S. I have not read the comics. :)**

* * *

Five knows the possible consequences of going into his thirteen-year-old body. He knows he'll go through puberty… again. (As if the first time wasn't bad enough.) He knows he'll have to deal with being treated like a thirteen-year-old by his technically younger siblings. He knows he may end up with some flashbacks, that he could suddenly have his brain explode. There are a lot of things he has to watch out for, is the point.

But so far, so good. He's already been back for a few hours and hasn't shown any signs of having his head explode or any of the other terrible consequences. Other than puberty… again. But as far as he can tell, that'll be it.

His first major sign that something is wrong is when he's going to get Delores and he can't remember what she looks like. Sure, she's a mannequin and they all kind of look the same, but Delores is different. He has her features memorized; he wouldn't forget. He couldn't.

But he does. In the end, he finds her, but only because he remembers what outfit she'd been wearing when he first met her.

That's worrisome. He doesn't have time to dwell on it though because a moment later Hazel and Cha-Cha arrive, guns blazing.

When he does have time to dwell on it (too much time), he tries to reason what happened. Because Delores is too important to him for him to just forget. He would never just… forget.

But he did. And there are more things, little things, he's started having trouble remembering. Things like how many people he's killed, how to take apart a semi-automatic, how things worked when the Hander told him what to do.

And the thing is, he knew this was a possibility. He's reverting. Back to the mind he had at this age. The mind he had when he jumped that first time. Before everything went to shit. Before he buried his siblings. And man is that going to be confusing because he's going to wake up in the future with adult siblings (soon, it could be tomorrow, it could be the next day, definitely in less than a week, the rate things are going) and he won't know how to stop the apocalypse. He almost feels bad for himself.

Well, he does, but not for _that _him. He feels bad for this him, the one he is now who has only forgotten the way things look and how to take apart a semi-automatic, not everything.

The only logical thing to do is hope he can get this end-of-the-world business finished with before he's thirteen again. Properly thirteen again, that is. And just in case he'll leave notes for himself, because no-doubt before he's thirteen again he'll forget parts of his plan (though to be fair, his plan isn't really so much a plan as a guideline to an end goal. The steps in-between don't matter as long as the end result is the world _not_ ending).

He really, really hopes he manages to solve it before the whole memory-loss-thing finishes though. Perhaps he should be more concerned about the memory loss. But he's not. Sure, it'll erase him - this him - from existence, but really, it's only fair that the kid who traveled to the apocalypse deserves a chance to grow up semi-normal. Well, as much semi-normal as he will be living with thirty-year-old versions of his siblings.

It isn't really that hard, as far as things go. His memory loss continues to get worse. He starts forgetting more things, things like how old he is, what the apocalypse looked like, who Delores is, not just what she looks like.

The memory loss isn't uniform. He loses memories from turning fourteen in the burnt earth he'd lived on for so long and memories from being over fifty. Scattered memories. It's only been three days since he got back here. He hurries to finishes his notes to himself while managing everything else.

Then that night he gets drunk in a library.

* * *

"Shit," Five mumbles to himself. "My head is killing me."

"Five, you okay?" a voice asks, rough and deep. Five doesn't recognize it. He tenses but doesn't move. Fist step; asses the situation.

He opens his eyes and sees a hulking man with dark blonde hair.

"Who the hell are you?" he asks before he can stop himself.

The man blinks and looks over Five carefully. "You know me, Five. Did you hit your head last night?"

"I was going through time, last I remember. Who are you? Where am I?" Five demands.

"How old is your consciousness," the man asks instead of answering Five's questions.

"What type of question is that?" Five asks with disdain. "I'm thirteen. Who are you?"

The man takes a deep breath and sighs deeply, slumping in his chair.

"I'm Luther, Five."

Five looks closely at the man, and yeah, quite a few of his features resemble the thirteen-year-old Luther Five is used to. Except for this man is not thirteen and he's massive.

"Prove it," Five tells him. "Prove you're Luther. Tell me something only he would know. Now."

"You got in a fight with dad and ran out of the house. Then you time-traveled," the maybe-Luther says tiredly. "You were gone for seventeen years, Five. Then four days ago you appeared again and told us you had accidentally gone to the apocalypse, which happens in four more days. You said you'd been trapped there for forty-five years, but that when you got back you had to put your consciousness into this body. Something about quantum mechanics."

Five blinks. That's a… lot. "But I'm thirteen. The last thing I remember is starting to jump. Prove you're Luther. You could be lying. Show me the tattoo."

At that moment a door slams open. Five's eyes dart to where another man has entered. He also looks familiar. He has a scar on the side of his head and he's wearing an impressive amount of leather.

He sees Five and growls before running for him, screaming something. Five sits up and stares in shock at the man.

"Diego," Maybe-Luther snaps, grabbing the man around the middle and lifting him up. "Listen to me."

"He needs to-"

"Five thinks he's thirteen."

That stops the man (is it really Diego?) short.

"I am thirteen," Five mutters, glaring at both of his maybe brothers.

"What," Maybe-Diego says flatly. He still seems upset, but Five thinks he's probably more shocked than anything else now.

"I don't know," Maybe-Luther says. "But he really is acting thirteen. Not like when he first came back."

"For all we know he's lying. Again," Maybe-Diego snaps, but something in his eyes is unsure.

"You still haven't proven you're my siblings," Five says. "Prove it to me. Now."

"Just as demanding as ever," Maybe-Diego says bitterly. "I don't see a difference."

Maybe-Luther glares at Maybe-Diego. Huh. They could be his siblings all grown up. They certainly are fighting enough. Maybe-Diego glares right back for a moment, then he walks up to Five and yanks his sleeve up, showing off a tattoo. The same tattoo Five has and all the others share (except for Vanya). Oh god, he really is in the future. They're all adults. Thirty-years-old.

"Where's everyone else?" Five asks dully.

"Klaus is missing," Diego says. "He was kidnapped by people looking for _you_. He escaped and they killed the detective who saved him. Allison is with Vanya at her apartment."

"What about Ben?" Five asks.

Diego looks away. "I still need to go. See you never."

He disappears out the door a moment later.

"I want to go home," Five says. "Can we just… the house is still here?"

"Dad's dead, but yeah, we still have the house," Luther says.

"Good," Five says. "I'm going there."

With that, he teleports. He doesn't go far, just to the outside of the building. He keeps going, across the city until he's in front of the house. It's still as menacing as ever. Yay. But at least he won't have to deal with dad.

He teleports inside, and really nothing's changed. Except for the portrait of him hanging on the wall. He ignores it and goes up to his room.

It's just like he remembers, except much dustier. There is a stack of new notes on his bed though. Five picks them up and starts reading through them.

Mostly it's facts about the end of the world and how to prevent it. Information about what to do if he can't stop the end of the world. The last page isn't stuff like that. It's a letter. To him. Also from him, but whatever.

_I'm sure you're confused. Don't worry about it. Long story short I'm you. Well, you who lived his life at the end of the world. I'm 58, technically. I managed to get back here. I'm trying to save the world. To get here I had to transfer my consciousness to my thirteen-year-old body. It's confusing and you don't care. The problem is it was only temporary, not that I expected it to be._

_Congratulations. You have a second chance. Enjoy it. Just stop the end of the world, okay? Good luck._

_~Five_

It's funny because the letter sounds like something he'd write, in a situation like this. It's short and to the point. It's also very strange. And how is he supposed to stop the end of the world? The notes only tell him to find whoever a plastic eye belongs to, and even that advice is crossed out.

So, he'll have to figure this out on his own. But maybe he should go visit Vanya. He misses her, even though it's only been an hour from his point of view. Then he'll figure out the whole apocalypse thing.


End file.
